Trust
by lobsterMatriarch
Summary: Cullen still has some changes to make.


Fear is a funny thing, how it disappears into routine. He forgets it, lets it push along on it's own, sixty pulses to the minute keeping him steadily and surely alive, and he can go about his business for months. Sometimes he notes how it takes root during his training, how it spikes when his recruit missed a step in a practice fight, how it sends blood to his face when she's waiting by his bed, darkened and weather-worn from an expedition further North, and she asks for a moment of his time.

And then it decides it wants to be noticed.

Sixty heartbeats a minute speeds to seventy, eighty, a hundred, a thousand, war drums echoing in his ears, footsteps marching through the gallows one after another, at least a hundred new charges (prisoners?) pass before he's had his morning draught and his head won't stop aching until he swallows.

"I need to borrow you." She smirks, and her hands find their way under his armor.

She moves quickly and with purpose. Her time is limited, precious, and he has reports that need to be read but his head has been throbbing ever since she left and his patience has worn thin. They fumble together in the starlight, and he reminds himself to trust her. He lets her tear down his protection piece by piece, tossing his gauntlets to the floor and taking his neck between her lips. Her teeth scrape his skin.

His heart pounds and abominations laugh in the empty hollows of his memory, a reminder of everything she could take. One wrong move would rend him open and bleed him dry, leaving his body for demons to pick clean.

She flicks her fingers and his breastplate falls to the floor, metal harsh against the stone, and she pulls back to kiss him. She bites his lip, hard and possessive, and he groans.

The clasps of her shirt fall open one by one and he's in awe. His blood is on fire and his head is spinning and he can ignore it because she is there, and he is hers, button by button he will show her his resolve. Her chest heaves with every breath and he traces her skin with his thumb, soft, scarred, crisscrossed with branches of ink, paler under her breast band as he pulls it aside. He would love to see her under that blazing desert sun, light sinking into her skin, gold halos in her hair.

He licks and bites at her command, hands at her waist, his resolve cracking, but even though his hands shake his mouth is steady. She gasps. She's always quiet, but generous with her noises. He has to listen carefully to find her approval, taking note of her breathing, her whispers in elvhen, and if he was very, very lucky she would stumble over his name.

"I missed you." She says with a smile.

"I missed you, too." The words hardly seem adequate, but they're all he can think of.

Her tongue runs along her lip, her long lashes framing darkened eyes, crinkling at the corners as he pulls down her smallclothes. She knots her fingers in his hair, pulling him to her, kissing him hard before she allows him to fall to his knees. Her hands are soft but strong, guiding him along her thighs while his tongue leaves its trail.

He savors the first taste of her as she shakes around him, the first of what he hopes will be many quiet gasps pulled from her mouth. He parts her gently, carefully, so his tongue can explore further, push closer, feel more. She stumbles but he will never let her fall, even as her nails claw deep his shoulders.

"C-Cullen." There it was. His nails bit the skin of her hips as she struggled to remain standing, the sound setting him aflame as sure as any magic. His tongue circled her clit before pressing against her, broad and flat and so hot he worries, or maybe hopes, that she might burn him.

He can feel the pull of the Fade around her as she comes undone. She shakes, convulses around him and clings to him for support as he guides her through.

A small drop of blood welled from her scratches. Two years ago that would have him searching for a weapon, and ten years ago he would have had her in chains for it. Her eyes meet his, clouded and wide and full of something else entirely, and he wonders, not for the first time, if he's not the only one who has to put aside their fears.

He's not a templar anymore, he had assured her, just as she assured him she was safe, but he knows too well that a deep-seated fears don't care for assurances.

She pushes him to the ground and climbs over him, hips splayed over his, and as she lowers onto him all rational thought is lost. She's warm, beautiful, safe and savage all at once and he lifts himself to take hold of her, driving his hips up until his cock is buried to the hilt. She gasps for him. He doesn't think he's ever heard anything sound so sweet. He moves with her, head buried in her shoulder with her arms around his neck and for a few blissful minutes the fear that's left him crippled for years fades to background noise.

She's saying his name again.

He can't come, not yet, but the sound of it brings him so close. He snakes an arm between them and thumbs her clit, begs her to sink her teeth into him so the pain might give him some outlet of control, and she does. She sinks her teeth in his shoulder and oh Maker the pain is bliss. She shakes as she comes, and he rubs one hand along her back.

It's only after her breathing begins to slow that he allows himself to follow.

She smiles as she collapses next to him, her hair tickling his shoulder. "Creators, that was…" she trails off in laughter, and he soon joins. His shoulder still stings, and he can see the marks where his fingers bit into her hips. She doesn't seem to notice as she lays her head on his chest.

"I'm sorry, vhenan." She says. "I didn't mean to bite so hard."

"I can hardly be upset, I asked you to do it." He sneaks an arm around her, letting his fingers trace the vallaslin on her shoulder.

"Should we take you to a healer?"

"Don't bother. I like the marks you leave."

She seems satisfied with that, tucking herself into the hollow of his neck and closing her eyes.

It wasn't enough to save him, or absolve him, or whatever it was he wanted to pretend in the moment. He was certain, deep down, nothing ever would be. He would always be bitter, always be frightened, always have that first instinct to grab his sword, but he knows now that he can be better. He can ignore the impulses until they become nothing but a nagging ache in the back of his mind.

Her breathing's slowed. He never fails to be impressed with just how quickly she can fall asleep, in how much faith she's placed in him to leave herself so open in his care.

A thousand mages he had allowed to fall to ruin. Let her be the first one whose trust in him is deserved.


End file.
